


Sasquatch Domesticus

by sunflowerseedsandscience



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-16
Updated: 2016-09-16
Packaged: 2018-08-15 07:22:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,684
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8047522
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunflowerseedsandscience/pseuds/sunflowerseedsandscience
Summary: "So when you said the shelter didn't have room," Mulder says, "you didn't mean that they were full.""I never said they were full, Mulder," says Scully, not meeting his eye.  "I said they didn't have room for him.  And they didn't.""That's because they're a dog shelter, Scully, and that thing is not a dog.  It's a pony.  A horse.  A mysterious woodland creature descended from Sasquatch.  If it had antlers, it could be a moose."  Scully's face lights up."Moose!" she exclaims.  "That's a perfect name for him!"





	Sasquatch Domesticus

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CrossedBeams](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrossedBeams/gifts).



Mulder's cell phone rings just as he's turning onto the long gravel driveway up to the house. He answers without glancing at the screen, already knowing who it'll be.

"Mulder, it's me." He grins.

"Hey, Scully, miss me already?" He can almost hear her rolling her eyes over the phone.

"We've got a problem at the animal shelter," she says, not bothering to respond to his teasing. "They've got almost all the dogs processed and settled in... but there's one left, and they don't have room for him." 

This doesn't surprise Mulder. Earlier this afternoon, he and Scully closed the file on one Mr. David Puckett, a man who believed that the spiritual energies emanating from his property were attracting animals from all over the neighborhood. An investigation failed to turn up evidence of any such phenomenon... but what it _did_ turn up were seventeen cats, four goats, a large, brown cow, a Shetland pony, and thirty-six dogs. All packed into a half-acre fenced lot in a quiet suburban D.C. neighborhood. 

The stench had been unspeakable.

In spite of Mr. Puckett's stubborn insistence that all of the animals had found their way to his property of their own volition, it quickly came to light that the pony, the cow, and several of the dogs had been reported stolen from local farms. Mr. Puckett had been arrested, and the unclaimed animals had been carted off to local shelters, where they would be checked for microchips and matched against missing animal reports from local veterinarians. But with so many animals, and most shelters already near their capacity, it's not a surprise that there's one poor mutt left out in the cold.

"Poor guy," says Mulder sympathetically. "Do they know if he has a chip yet?"

"No, no chip," says Scully. "And it's after five on a Friday evening, so most of the vets' offices are closed. They won't be able to call around to see if anyone's missing him until Monday morning."

"They can't double up a couple of dogs in their cages for a few days?" asks Mulder.

"No, they really, really don't have space for him, Mulder," says Scully. Mulder pulls to a stop in front of the house and climbs out of his car. In the front window, he can see Daggoo, balanced on the back of the couch, looking out at him, wagging his tail furiously. The little Jack Russell mix is Scully's, in theory, a poorly-thought-out acquisition following a case last month. When Scully made the spur-of-the-moment decision to steal the little dog, she had neglected to first check the pet policy at her building.

So now, Mulder has a dog.

He doesn't mind, not really. Daggoo is good company, and an equally good excuse for Scully to spend more and more time out at the house. He's sweet, friendly, and gets along well with other dogs, so Mulder doesn't hesitate to make his suggestion.

"Why don't you bring him out here, Scully?" he says. "Just for the weekend. The shelter can try and find out who he belongs to on Monday." He hears Scully's sigh of relief through the phone.

"That's exactly what I was hoping you would say," she says. "Which is why I'm already on my way out there." He laughs.

"What were you going to do if I said no?" he asks.

"I knew you wouldn't," she says. "I'll be there in a half hour, okay?"

 

\----------

 

Mulder is sitting on the porch, Daggoo at his side, when Scully's ridiculously oversized SUV turns off the main road and begins to wind up the drive towards the house. Daggoo leaps to his feet, barking and dancing in excited circles, taking off down the porch steps as Scully parks the car and climbs out. She turns and opens the back door... and Daggoo comes to a halt so quickly, Mulder swears he can almost hear screeching brakes.

Scully leans into the backseat. "Come on, boy," she coaxes, holding out a hand. "Come on, it's just Daggoo, he won't hurt you." Mulder catches up to Daggoo and pulls him back. He peers into the car, expecting to see a little dog cowering in the corner... and his mouth drops open. He can't even _see_ Scully's backseat.

"Scully," he says, "that is _not_ a dog."

The animal folded tightly into Scully's car has the shape of a dog, it's true, but it's about the size of the cow they found on Puckett's property. In fact, for a moment, Mulder wonders if it even _was_ a cow they saw. There's an excellent chance they spied this animal lurking in the corner of the yard and assumed that that was what it was.

"Of course it's a dog, Mulder," Scully says. She leans further into the backseat and seizes the beast's collar, giving it a hard but ineffectual yank. "Come on, boy, get out of the car!" The animal gives a pathetic whine and tries to scrunch himself closer to the opposite door. Scully turns to Mulder. "Mulder, can you put Daggoo in the house for a minute? He's scaring him."

"Daggoo is scaring _that_?"

"He's not a _that_ , Mulder, he's a dog, and he's had a terrifying day. Now will you please put Daggoo in the house so I can get the poor thing out of the car?" Shaking his head, Mulder scoops up Daggoo, not bothering to try to make him come of his own volition, and carries him into the house, closing the door firmly. When he returns to the car, Scully is still trying to cajole the canine monstrosity out and onto the driveway. The animal is not having it.

"So when you said the shelter didn't have room," Mulder says, "you didn't mean that they were full."

"I never said they were _full_ , Mulder," says Scully, not meeting his eye. "I said they didn't have room for him. And they didn't."

"That's because they're a dog shelter, Scully, and that thing is not a dog. It's a pony. A horse. A mysterious woodland creature descended from Sasquatch. If it had antlers, it could be a moose." Scully's face lights up.

"Moose!" she exclaims. "That's a perfect name for him!" She turns back to the car. "Come on, Moose, it's okay," she croons, and the newly-christened animal cautiously sticks its boxy head out of the car door. As it begins to unfold its gangly limbs, Mulder notices a multitude of fluff decorating the car seat beneath it.

"What's all that white stuff?" he asks Scully.

"He ate my headrest," she replies matter-of-factly.

"He ate your headrest?" Mulder repeats. "Scully, he ate your _car_ , and you want him to stay at the _house_?"

"It's just for the weekend," she promises. "Great Danes are expensive, Mulder. I can almost guarantee Puckett stole him. Somebody, somewhere reported this guy missing, and on Monday morning, we can find out who it was and get him home." Moose tentatively places his enormous front paws on the driveway, looking to Scully for reassurance. She scratches behind his ear, and there's a loud thumping sound from within the car as the dog wags his tail. With a plaintive canine grumble, he unfolds the rest of his body, and Mulder finds himself standing snout-to-chest with the largest dog he has ever seen. Moose is large enough to rest his head on Scully's shoulder, which he does, looking up (barely) at Mulder with soulful brown eyes. He gives a dramatic sigh, and drool cascades down the sleeve of Scully's expensive blazer. She doesn't seem to notice. "Come on, Mulder, please?" The pleading expression in Moose's eyes has nothing on the look in Scully's. Mulder shakes his head.

"On one condition, Scully," he says. "You need to stay, too. I am not babysitting this thing on my own." Scully beams.

"I was planning on it," she says, and his heart skips a beat.

"Before or after you picked up the dog?" he asks. She doesn't answer, only gives him an enigmatic smile and heads into the house, Moose plodding along behind her.

 

\-----------------------

 

When they bought this house, after two years of being on the road non-stop, Mulder and Scully had not been looking for anything large or spacious. In fact, given the absence in their lives that neither had really even begun to deal with, too much space, too many empty rooms, had been something both had wanted desperately to avoid.

A two-hundred-pound dog had never been something they'd thought they might need to plan for. And the fact that said two-hundred-pound dog seems to be terrified of Daggoo only makes matters worse.

When Moose first enters the front door, Daggoo approaches him cautiously, presumably never having encountered anything quite so large. Moose responds to Daggoo's polite, hesitant sniffs with a panicked yelp. He skitters haphazardly across the wooden floor, leaping into an armchair which, not being designed to handle the sudden weight of a small elephant, tips over backwards, spilling Moose onto the floor with another frightened yelp. The dog gathers his ungainly legs underneath himself and shoot off into the kitchen, flattening himself against the floor and squeezing under the table, somehow managing to knock all of the chairs over with an almighty crash. His back bumps the underside of the table, knocking over the vase of flowers sitting atop it and sending water dripping onto the floor. Scully rushes to grab a towel to sop it up, then crouches down next to Moose, stroking his head soothingly.

"Shhh, Moose, it's okay," she croons. "Daggoo won't hurt you. Will you, Daggoo?" She holds out the hand not stroking Moose, summoning the smaller dog to her. Daggoo trots over, licks Scully's face once, and then stretches out his neck to touch noses with Moose. The Great Dane trembles for a moment... then, suddenly, his massive tail begins thumping a steady rhythm on the wooden floor. He stretches out his snout and lets loose a tongue so large, it covers Daggoo's entire head in one lick, Scully's in another. She laughs and falls back, letting go of both dogs, who take this as a signal to leap to their feet and tear back into the living room. Daggoo leaps onto the couch and Moose follows, sending the couch thumping loudly against the wall, knocking the lamps off of the end tables. Both dogs leap off of the couch, and while Daggoo has no trouble running back to the kitchen, Moose finds the space between the chairs and the coffee table too difficult to navigate, and he rams into the table with enough force to knock it clear across the living room. Magazines scatter everywhere.

"So, I think maybe we should take them for a walk?" suggests Scully, flattening herself against a wall as the dogs sail by yet again. "To tire them out before dinner?"

"A walk?" says Mulder. "Sure, fine. There's still some horse tack hanging up in the barn. I'll go get it and we'll hitch him up."

 

\----------

 

The sun is going down as they make their way down the path that leads to the lake at the edge of the property, and there's a definite chill in the air. Daggoo is trotting along in front of Scully, hardly pulling on his leash at all, but Moose is straining all over the place, dragging Mulder to inspect every bush, tree stump, and suspicious-looking clump of grass they encounter. Mulder keeps yanking back on the leash, but it's to no avail: Moose pays him absolutely no mind.

"You've gotta try harder than that to control him," says Scully, shaking her head. "He's running away with you."

"Scully, Arnold Schwarzenegger couldn't control this dog," says Mulder. "I think he weighs as much as I do."

"It's about attitude, not size," says Scully. "If he knows you're in control, it doesn't matter if he outweighs you or not." Mulder bristles.

"Fine, then," he says recklessly, holding Moose's leash out to Scully. "You show me how it's done, and I'll take Daggoo."

"Fine," says Scully. They switch places. Before Moose even has a chance to start pulling, Scully gives the leash a sharp tug.

"Moose, _heel_ ," she says, her voice full of authority. Moose glances over his shoulder at her... and to Mulder's shock (and chagrin), the dog is suddenly plodding along the path in front of them, the leash hanging slack between his neck and Scully's hand. Daggoo, by contrast, is suddenly zigzagging all over the place, surging desperately ahead, panting as he strains at his collar. Scully grins up at Mulder, who scowls.

"Next time, you can walk them both yourself," he grumbles. They're nearly to the lake now, and they stop for a moment, watching the sun going down across the still water. Scully reaches out and takes Mulder's hand, leaning against his shoulder, and instantly, his bad mood is a thing of the past. He turns and presses a kiss to her hair, and she looks up at him, smiling. "I'm glad you're staying for the weekend," he says.

"So am I," she replies, pulling his hand up and touching her lips to his fingers. Mulder wonders how she'll respond if he tries to kiss her. The look on her face suggests she's expecting it, and so he leans down. Scully tilts her head back and closes her eyes, and just before Mulder does the same, he sees, at the edge of his vision, a flock of ducks taking off from the brush surrounding the lake. Moose gives a loud bark... and suddenly, Scully disappears from his side. Looking up, Mulder sees Moose galloping towards the lake in pursuit of the ducks, Scully dragged behind him, bouncing along the ground as she tries to dig in her feet.

"Heel, Moose! _HEEL!_ " Moose gives absolutely no indication that he's heard her.

"Let go of the leash, Scully!" calls Mulder, running after them. "Scully! _LET GO!_ " But it's too late. Moose bounds through the thick brambles at water's edge, pulling Scully after him. She cries out in pain as the thorns tear into her skin, and with a loud splash, she and Moose land in the water. This unexpected development sends Moose into a panic, and even though the water's not deep, he begins flailing around, barking up a storm. The water's up to Scully's shoulders, and she swims over to Moose, taking him by his collar and dragging him towards the shore. Mulder wades in to meet them, and between the two of them, they manage to ease the shivering, frightened dog out of the water. Moose shakes himself off and, yipping loudly, takes off in the direction of the house. Scully flops onto her back, closing her eyes. Mulder winces at the multitude of scratches all over her face, neck, and hands. The thorns have torn through her blouse in several places.

"Next time," she says, glaring up at him, " _you_ can take them both for a walk."

 

\--------

 

"Ouch!"

"Hold still, almost done." Scully is sitting on the bed, wrapped in a towel, as Mulder applies antibiotic ointment to the scrapes on her back. He ran out and grabbed a pizza for dinner while Scully showered off the mud from the lake, and he's feeling more than a little lucky that he's arrived home in time to do this for her. She relaxes as he finishes, leaning back against his chest. He closes the tube of ointment, sets it aside, and slides his arms around her waist. The towel begins to come loose, but she makes no move to secure it.

"You got the pizza?" she asks, tilting her head back against his shoulder, giving him better access to her neck. He kisses the skin just under her ear, and she shivers.

"Yup," he says. He gives the towel a tug and it sags down around her hips, exposing her breasts. He takes one in his hand, massaging it, pinching the nipple between thumb and forefinger. She gasps and reaches behind her, snaking her hand between him, cupping him through his pants. He moans and bites gently at the skin on her shoulder, carefully avoiding the scratches the thorns left behind.

"Mushrooms and peppers on my half?" she asks.

"Of course." He slides his hand down, pushing the towel completely off of her, slipping two fingers into her.

"Mmmm, you do know what I like," she sighs, closing her eyes. "Where'd you leave it?" He frowns slightly.

"The pizza?"

"Mmm-hmm."

"It's on the counter in the kitchen," he says, and she freezes. "What?"

"Where are the dogs?" she asks, sitting up.

"They're downstairs," he says. "Why does it...." And suddenly he realizes what she's getting at. " _Shit_ ," he swears, leaping off of the bed. Scully follows, pulling the towel back around herself, and they both pound down the stairs at top speed. They run in the the kitchen just in time to see Moose, standing next to the kitchen counter (which, of course, is far below the level of his head), the last of the pizza disappearing into his mouth. Daggoo sits in the corner, looking left out and distinctly jealous. Mulder heaves a sigh, then goes over to the counter and grabs his keys.

"Guess I'm going for another pizza," he says.

 

\-------------

 

Mulder is pleasantly surprised by three things at bedtime. First, Scully hops into bed with him without hesitation, without even a suggestion that one of them should take the guest room or the couch. Second, she seems completely amenable to picking up right where they'd left off just prior to discovering the fate of their dinner. And third, they find that, wherever Moose lived prior to ending up at Mr. Puckett's house, he clearly had been trained that human beds were off-limits to him, because he doesn't even try to climb up with them. He follows them into the bedroom, but plods over to a corner and curls up on the rug... leaving Mulder free to undress Scully and indulge in her body in ways he hasn't been allowed to nearly enough as of late.

He's at the foot of the bed, his face buried between her thighs, when she suddenly stiffens. 

"Oh, Christ," she groans. It's a perfectly normal thing for her to say when he's down here... but the tone is all wrong. Mulder lifts his head... and away from the rich, intoxicating scent of her, he's suddenly aware of exactly what's going on.

"Jesus!" He pulls away, burying his nose in the sheets. Above him, Scully grabs a pillow and holds it tightly across her face.

"It's the pizza," she says, her voice muffled. "It must have upset his stomach." Across the room, Moose lifts his head to look at them, then gives a theatrical grumble and flops onto his side, releasing another dose of toxic gas as he does. Mulder leaps to his feet, his arm held across his nose, trying to keep his breathing as shallow as possible.

"Out!" he says, nudging at Moose with his foot. When Moose doesn't respond, Mulder bends and grabs him by the collar, pulling him to his feet and walking him forcibly from the bedroom, closing the door behind him. He crosses to the window, throwing it open.

"Mulder, it's forty degrees out there," protests Scully, clamoring for the quilt and pulling it over herself. "We'll freeze."

"It's just until the smell dissipates," he promises, burrowing under the quilt with her. "And besides, I can think of ways we can keep warm in the meantime."

 

\------------

 

The weekend is at once the most enjoyable and the most ridiculous that Mulder has spent in a long, long time. He has plenty of time with Scully, it's true, but he also has plenty of time with the two hundred pounds of upset stomach and unbridled energy that is Moose. He and Daggoo spend most of the weekend chasing each other all over the house and all over the yard, and Mulder and Scully quickly learn to get out of the way as fast as possible when the two dogs get going. Even if Moose doesn't actually run into them, a passing swipe from his powerful tail is often enough to raise welts on their arms and legs. By Saturday night, Moose's tail has upended every vase, knickknack, and kitchen appliance in the house, and Mulder has even found spots where the lethal weapon attached to Moose's backside has knocked the plaster right off of the walls.

An entire plate of pancakes is sacrificed to Moose's appetite on Sunday morning when Mulder again forgets to put the food out of reach, and the entire day is spent in another fog of noxious gas. So when Monday morning arrives, and the shelter calls to say that Moose's owners have been located, Mulder is all too eager to load the dog into Scully's car and ride with her back to the city to bid him farewell. Daggoo watches them forlornly from the front window as they leave, but Mulder is having a hard time mustering up any sympathy for him.

When they pull up in front of the shelter, a family of four is waiting. Moose spies them through the window and immediately goes wild, trying to turn tight circles in the backseat and only succeeding in smacking both Mulder and Scully with his tail, knocking their sunglasses to the floor. Mulder leaps out and opens the back door, not even bothering to grab for Moose's leash. Moose bounds enthusiastically across the parking lot towards the two little boys, who are jumping up and down excitedly.

"Sasquatch!" the boys squeal as the dog reaches them, bowling them over. Their parents help them back to their feet, and soon, the entire family is trying to embrace the wiggling dog, who is trying just as hard to kiss all of them at once. "Sasquatch, we missed you!" Mulder and Scully raise their eyebrows at each other.

"Sasquatch?" says Scully dubiously. Mulder grins.

"A mysterious woodland creature, just like I told you on Friday," he says. "See, Scully? Bigfoot's real after all."


End file.
